Summer plans and help!

Jefften10 · Mar 28, 2006

Ok, so I have a good chuck of moneyy saved up, and within the next few months I am goiong to be doing some serious building. Here is the plan:
Keep my F23 in my car and buy another used F23 for 300 or 400 dollars.
Buy and H23 head, and leave Vtec out of the equation.
Now question and advice:
Do I build the block for high compression (N/A)
or do I try to piece together a turbo, since I don't know if I can actually afford a kit, and if so, how would I do that.
The advantage of buying the engine, which are a dime a dozen, is so that I can drive my car during the build and swap unti I am ready to actually swap.
I am accumulating research and engine books, along with friends who have done engine work on their cars so this can be successfull.

A few more quick questions:
Since I don't want to use Vtec, can I just buy the F23A5 for a little cheaper, or should I stick to the F23a1?
Can I just buy the engine only since I already have a starter, alternator and manual transmission, (all the parts obviously)
Besides a p14 to get the head working properly, what other Ecu work will I need to do.

I really appreciate your help, and if anyone wants to come on out to Dallas this summer to help me with this hopefully successful build, let me know.

Hush · Mar 28, 2006

How much money do you have? Putting that head on is going to be alot of work and if your not doing the work i wouldn't even touch that with a 10ft pole. I'd rather save for a turbo set up or go for the almighty H22 and swap that in. My plans are starting to change from getting an H22 to a turbo kit but there at limits to what a turbo can give you. If you have extra money laying around i say get a cat back and lower the car and call it a day till you have enough for a turbo or H22. just my .02

ryan s · Mar 28, 2006

turbo is addictive. id say build the f23 cause theres nothing like the feeling of boost.

BlkCurrantKord · Mar 28, 2006

F23A5 - H23 Head - Crower Stg 3's - 11.5:1 comp - Just don't try and rev it past 6500 rpms.

Jefften10 · Mar 28, 2006

BlkCurrantKord said:
F23A5 - H23 Head - Crower Stg 3's - 11.5:1 comp - Just don't try and rev it past 6500 rpms.

So I should stick with high compression and screw the turbo?

BlkCurrantKord · Mar 28, 2006

Jefften10 said:
So I should stick with high compression and screw the turbo?

I would but I'm biased towards N/A over boost anyways.

Hush · Mar 28, 2006

even if you dont' boost you can always go with the H22 theres your N/A right there.

Jefften10 · Mar 28, 2006

Hush said:
even if you dont' boost you can always go with the H22 theres your N/A right there.

See, but I don't want to do a complete engine swap. The F23 has so much potential for power, but I do want the H23 Head.
I figured that leaving Vtec out of the equation would make things much more easy.

How much do you think it would cost to put a turbo together?

retroshark · Mar 28, 2006

depends what parts you get. if you get a kit, you could speend about 3500 on parts... thats a huge waste.

for around 2800 you could have a kickass setup and then just need tuning. dont bother with a h23 head, its a waste. stick with the motor you have and definately dont swap an h22, its a bad starting point for a boosted setup.

if you want info on turbo setups, do a search on the site, theres a whole post i did about them. if you really want heavy info, PM me and i can give you lists of sites and parts that im persoonally going to use.

my thoughts on the whole turbo F23 business is to just leave the motor alone and use the money on good parts. after youve run the car for a while on the stock internals, and gotten a feel for what you like and dont like about turbos, you can move to internals. that means, lower comp cams, pistons, rings, rods blah blah blah.

oh, and you really need a manual tranny to make the most use out of your power

Jefften10 · Mar 28, 2006

retroshark said:
depends what parts you get. if you get a kit, you could speend about 3500 on parts... thats a huge waste.

for around 2800 you could have a kickass setup and then just need tuning. dont bother with a h23 head, its a waste. stick with the motor you have and definately dont swap an h22, its a bad starting point for a boosted setup.

if you want info on turbo setups, do a search on the site, theres a whole post i did about them. if you really want heavy info, PM me and i can give you lists of sites and parts that im persoonally going to use.

my thoughts on the whole turbo F23 business is to just leave the motor alone and use the money on good parts. after youve run the car for a while on the stock internals, and gotten a feel for what you like and dont like about turbos, you can move to internals. that means, lower comp cams, pistons, rings, rods blah blah blah.

oh, and you really need a manual tranny to make the most use out of your power

Already have the manual

I really appreciate all the different angles and opinions that people have given, and I have been accummulating information such as compression ratios of similiar Honda engines, hybrid parts, and prcies etc. I want to be very organized about this build once I make my mind up exactly.
Please keep your suggestions comming!